


reduced, remade

by SkadizzleRoss



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Adorable Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Connor & Upgraded Connor | RK900 are Siblings, Gen, Good Parent Hank Anderson, Hank Anderson Adopts Connor, Human AU, Human Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Human Upgraded Connor | RK900, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:08:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22903744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkadizzleRoss/pseuds/SkadizzleRoss
Summary: Hank comforts a scared kid after a house fire. No big deal, just part of the job. Definitely doesn't lose (much) sleep over it.Until a week later, when a six-year-old Connor's marching into a Detroit police station and declaring, "I'm looking for Mister Officer Hank."
Relationships: Hank Anderson & Connor
Comments: 18
Kudos: 427





	reduced, remade

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for sooome child peril/illness (implied) and an offscreen Dis/ney treatment for Mr. and Mrs. Arkay.

It’s been awhile since Hank’s worked a fire. 

Detective job comes with its perks; less cardio, more deskwork, and no more of this shit. Standing here, feeling hose water soak through his shoes and watching someone’s life belongings billow up and blot out the stars. 

This isn’t his gig anymore, but he got the all-call, and he was close by - so here he is. 

Staring at a fully-involved house fire and wondering who's in charge of the kid.

No one, by the looks of it.

He's standing on the curb in bare feet and sooty PJs, this tiny, stagnant thing among all the chaos. Bustling firemen and whipping hoses, long arcs of water catching the first orange flames bursting through the roof.

The kid isn't crying. He isn't doing much of anything, just wrapping the sleeves of his PJs tight around his fingers and watching a fireman hustling across the lawn, a bundle of something small in his arms.

Hank drops into a kneel next to him, pulling off his jacket as he goes. "Hey, kid."

The kid says nothing, so Hank continues: "Kinda chilly out here, isn't it? Why don't you come sit with me?"

That earns him a little focus and a wary stare. Better.

"It's alright. I'm a police officer." He hooks a thumb towards the cruiser as Exhibit A, then offers him a hand. "My name's Hank."

Kids like that sometimes, getting the grown-up treatment. This particular one stares long enough - his eyes wide and dark - that Hank thinks he's not gonna be won over that easy. Then he takes his hand in a tiny grip and completes one careful shake.

Hank asks, "What's your name?"

"Connor," he answers in a barely-there voice. He doesn’t let go of Hank’s hand, small fingers gripping at his forefinger and palm brushing his wedding ring.

He gets Connor sitting in the back of the car and wrapped up in the blanket. Takes an intentionally bad guess at his age - "You must be about 17, huh?" and gets a stoic "Six," in reply.

"Six, huh," Hank echoes. He tries to ignore that prickling heat at his back.

He promises Connor he'll be back in a snap as he gently extracts his hand.

He's digging through his trunk for a proper blanket when he finds the stuffed animal, jammed in between a wad of evidence baggies and a road repair kit. It’s a tan teddy bear, still in the plastic wrap, the DPD logo stitched onto its chest.

Holdover from his beat cop days. Hank pulls the plastic off and brings the teddy back to Connor, who studies it as gravely as he had Hank's hand.

"Go ahead," Hank says. "It's yours."

The kid takes the bear in careful hands and - after a heavy beat - clutches it close.

Hank spends the better part of an hour in the backseat of his cruiser, Connor wrapped up tight in his jacket and tucked under his arm for good measure. One of the EMTs swings by and gives his lungs a quick listen, asks a few things.

Hank asks, “Parents already at the hospital?” He’d seen an ambulance take off way back, lights blazing.

The EMT shakes her head. “Social worker should be here soon.”

Hank thinks: _Oh._

Connor doesn’t like it when the social worker turns up. He makes the first noise he’s made all night, fussing sleepily as Hank picks him up and carries him to her car in a bundle.

He's still got that teddy bear in a white-knuckle grip, though. Won't be letting that go anywhere.

Hank would hope it was something to remember him by, but honestly – he’s hoping the kid doesn’t remember any of tonight.

Once the kid’s gone, he crosses his arms against the damp cold and catches one of the firemen mucking around by the truck. He gets most of the story.

He wishes he hadn't.

Two kids. An infant brother, over at Detroit Memorial now, and Connor. Both parents gone.

He sleeps like shit, and Sharon asks him to spill or go torture the couch with his fidgeting.

He opts for the couch.

He isn’t quite sure how to phrase it, the way the kid had looked - standing on the curb in bare feet, staring up into the guttering flames.

+++

Connor doesn’t like the social worker.

Her name is Ms. Shaw, and he doesn’t like the way she leads him from one boring room to another, places with hard plastic chairs that he can’t fall asleep in, and a loud room with other kids, and then a louder hospital room.

The hospital room has lots of wires and sounds and people clustered around a green crib, all of them talking but none of them listening.

Connor asks three times if he can hold Liam before one of the white-coat doctors tell him no. He doesn't ask again.

He finds a corner to sit and watch all the adults talk. When Ms. Shaw frowns at him like he's doing something wrong, he doesn't understand. All he knows is how to hold Liam and how to feed him, and they said he can't do that, so-- he waits.

He tries to be quiet, he tries to be _good,_ but when he asks if he can go home, if he can see his mom, Ms. Shaw gets quiet and says a lot of things that don't make sense, and at the end of them is always the same thing: "You can't, darling. I'm sorry."

He tries to be good, but he's tired and cranky and he doesn't want to see any more people. He doesn't want to go anywhere but _home._

The day comes when Ms. Shaw dresses him up in a suit and tie and takes him to a room with lots of people.

A room with all these pictures of his parents and him and baby Liam, and everyone's trying to touch him and hug him and he--

He finds a table and hides away underneath, Mr. Hank's teddy held close. He starts crying and doesn't stop.

When they pull him out by the arm, he kicks and screams and cries that much harder; and Ms. Shaw puts him in the back of her car and leans her back against the glass and holds her head in her hands.

Ms. Shaw steps up onto the sidewalk, her cell phone up to her ear.

Connor hiccups, and holds his teddy tighter, and stares at the far door handle.

And then he crosses the seat and opens the door as quietly as he can and runs.

He saw the symbol on the building as they drove past, just like the one on his bear. It wasn’t far, he knows; he just goes backwards until he finds it again. Station #12.

He walks up to a looming front desk and tilts his head back as far as it can go and waits until someone leans over the desk far, far above him. He says, “I’m looking for Mister Officer Hank,” in as adult a voice he can muster, even if it teeters on the edges.

The cop frowns down at him under the brim of his black cap, and then he disappears. He reappears on the other side of the desk, planting his hands on his hips. “Hank, huh? Does he work here?”

“He’s a policeman,” Connor insists.

“Gotcha,” the officer says. “You here by yourself?”

Connor pulls his teddy closer and nods.

“Well, let’s see if we can find Officer Hank, alright?”

+++

It’s a Tuesday afternoon when Hank gets the call from some detective over at 12th. The guy rolls right into it, no preamble: “Did you work a house fire last week? Little kid involved?”

“Yeah, the Arkay fire. Why?”

“Got a six-year-old in my station, asking for a ‘Mister Officer Hank.’”

“Christ. Where’s his case worker?”

“Dunno. That’s my next call.”

“Ah… shit. Look, I’m not far, I’ll swing by. Let me call the case worker, I’ve already got her contact info.”

No particular reason he’d hunted down the social worker on the Arkay case, a fresh recruit named Tara Shaw. Definitely not anything he needed to disclose to his wife, who’d banned him from bringing anything home after the six-month-old St. Bernard.

By the time Hank arrives, Connor’s set up at his very own detective's desk, an untouched cup of hot cocoa on the desk next to him. He’s got his arms crossed and an imperious look on that’d be almost funny if his face wasn’t still splotchy with tears.

He recognizes Hank, though. And Hank recognizes that little suit and tie.

Suit, and a tie, and a teddy bear; shined shoes that don’t even touch the floor.

The case worker hadn’t mentioned the funeral.

“Heard you were looking for me, kid,” Hank says. That gets him a solemn nod. “What’d you need?”

Connor’s only just gathered up enough words to open his mouth when Ms. Shaw's gasping, " _Connor,_ " sounding every bit as frantic as she had on the phone.

The kid jolts out of his seat and starts looking for an exit; Hank throws out his arms, one to bring the case worker to a halt and the other to keep the kid from fleeing the building.

He speaks low and easy: "It's alright. We're gonna talk, okay? Let's go talk, you and me."

Hank waits for Connor to nod before he takes his hand and gets back to his full height.

Tara looks fresh out of a living nightmare, her hands clamped down hard on her elbows. "I didn't-- he just keeps _doing_ this--"

"We'll figure it out," Hank says, fighting to keep his voice even around the little hand curled into his own. "Wait here, alright? Looks like they've got cocoa, if you're partial to that."

He borrows an interrogation room. Bleak, but as private as they're going to get. He sets Connor down on the metal table and sits in a chair opposite. Lets the kid’s breathing even out, before he prompts again. "What did you want to talk about?"

This time, Connor doesn't hesitate. He blurts out, "I want to go _home,_ " in a choked voice, and Hank realizes this is going to hurt exactly as much as he anticipated.

He comes at it sideways, still on that slow and easy tone. "Do you understand what was happening today, Connor?"

Connor hiccups once, staring down at his lap. "They went to sleep and they didn't wake up so, so they put them in boxes--"

"Yeah," Hank says through a throat full of broken glass. "Your parents passed away, Connor. And your house isn't there anymore. I can't take you back there." Wishes to hell he could.

And the kid nods, twisting that knife a little tighter in Hank's stomach.

Connor asks in a small voice, "Where am I supposed to go?"

"We're working on finding you a home," Hank says.

Wrong thing to say, he knows, 'cause Connor's face ratchets tight and frustrated tears brighten the corner of his eyes. "I don't want that, I want to go _home_ \--"

"I know," Hank says, and finds that’s all he can say. Maybe all he _should_ say, as Connor’s tears start falling in earnest.

What else can he say to a six-year-old kid tumbling forward into him and sobbing, "I want my mom, I want to go _home--_ "

What else can he do, besides gather him up in a tight bundle in his lap and let him cry. Chasing aimless circles in his back and murmuring, "I know it, kid."

Hank tries not to think about how many of Station #12 gathers behind the one-way glass to watch this kid sob himself to sleep. Hank Anderson, Central Station narcotics star, with a six-year-old kid using him as his personal chaise lounge.

He'll definitely be hearing about this.

The kid stays asleep even as Hank gathers him up and brings him out to the break room couch. Tara's his uneasy shadow all the way there; even as Hank's settling a blanket over the sleeping kid, she's regarding Connor like he's a bomb on a short fuse.

"Don't take it personal," Hank says, once they're out in the relative safety of the hall. "I think he just wanted a second opinion."

Tara breathes out an explosive sigh, dropping her face into her hands. “We have a few interested parties for permanent placement, but the paperwork - you know how it is,” she mumbles from between her palms.

"Might have a shortcut," Hank muses.

Might take some finagling, he thinks. Some renegotiating on the Sumo Moratorium. 

Tara frowns at him. "I'm sorry, I don't see how--?"

"Would you be alright with a foster, for a start?"

They've had a handful of kids through the house. Older ones, the kind that have one foot out the door and just need a roof and some food; never with any plans of permanency. Doing their part, since the path to a kid of their own has been taking longer than anticipated.

Hank looks through the blinds at a sleeping kid with a bear tucked close, and feels like the warm weight of him might be ingrained in his skin, now.

Thinks maybe those plans are shifting under his very feet.

Tara's already lit up like Christmas, of course. Hank slows her with a raised hand. "I do have to clear it with the wife, first."

He lines up six reasonably casual ways to approach ‘ _hey, about that last foster being our last--_ ’ as the call carries through, but he's all of three sentences in before Sharon's asking, "Is this that thing from last week?" in her finest 'you think I don't know you, Hank Anderson?' tone.

He answers with a chagrined, "Yeah, that thing." He lets that settle a beat before he catches Tara's hopeful eye and adds, "Might be a couple things, actually."

+++

Sharon’s got the ‘ _Let’s not make a big deal out of this_ ’ face on when Hank drags through the front door that night. He’s got a sleeping kid piled up on his shoulder and a sore back from an afternoon of rushed paperwork, plus a carseat to return to the Fowlers first thing in the morning.

Sharon corrals the dog and herds Hank towards the guest room with a hushed charades act. If there’s a handwritten ‘ _Welcome, Connor_ ’ sign on the door and some new PJs laid out at the foot of the freshly-made bed - it’s not a big deal, not at all.

With some fancy maneuvering, Hank gets Connor de-shoed and under the covers, tucking the bear in along side. He doesn’t try for PJs. The kid’s in dire need of some sleep, by Tara’s telling.

“That’s it?” Sharon asks as he pulls the door just to. She’s looking at the bag slung over his elbow.

“Yeah,” Hank says. He opens his mouth to say more, but finds he doesn’t have anything more to say. This is their youngest foster by three years, and the first to turn up with nothing more than a plastic bag of secondhand clothes - mostly a rolled-up suit jacket and tie - and a teddy bear.

He tells the full story over microwaved leftovers, the things he hadn’t been able to fill her in on when she’d swung by for her part of the foster paperwork. She’d introduced herself to Connor, who’d watched her warily from under Hank’s arm before abruptly sticking out a hand for Sharon to shake.

He tells her about finding him on the curb, dusted with soot. Sitting with him in the car and feeling a hand curled up in the fabric of his shirt. Those things. Little things that have been fucking up his sleep for a week.

He finishes up with an accusatory, “Don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?” Sharon says around a demure sip of her water.

“Like I’m _adorable._ ”

“What’s adorable,” Sharon says as she gathers up his plate, “is how that kid’s got you wrapped around his pinky finger, Mister Officer Hank.”

“We’re not making a big deal out of this,” Hank says.

Sharon nods in sage disbelief.

+++

Hank drags his way towards bed feeling like a dead man, his brain stuck halfway between the case reports he never finished this afternoon and the fresh pile of stuff he’s got to tackle tomorrow. He ducks his head into the kid’s room on his way past, just in case–

And finds Connor’s not asleep anymore.

He’s sitting up against the headboard with his arms around his knees, staring at the far wall. When Hank pushes the door open a little more, he snaps wide eyes Hank’s way in the dim.

“Can’t sleep?” Hank asks.

Connor shakes his head slow.

“You hungry?”

Another shake of the head, and then he’s back to staring owlishly around the room. Hank steps in and flips a switch, sheds a little light on the situation. “This is my place. You remember?”

Another nod, but the kid’s not settling any; just staying scrunched up into his tight little ball, searching the nefariously floral corners of the room.

“New places are scary, huh. I tell you what, we’ve got some PJs here for you–” He picks up the flannels off the dresser. “Why don’t you change into these and come downstairs. You can sit on the couch with me for awhile, see if you start feeling sleepy again.”

Connor nods and Hank nods right back, sets the PJs down and moves out of the room.

The kid freezes by the stairs as he catches sight of Sumo sagging over the end of the couch, jowls cracked open and drooling like a madman. The bastard’s redirecting every ounce of his puppy energy into beating Hank’s chest in with his tail. Hank keeps a hand on his collar as he cranes his neck to the frozen kid and reassures, “It’s alright. He’s friendly. Do you like dogs?”

Connor nods cautiously. And he seems familiar with them; once he’s past the shock of how massive the St. Bernard is, Connor holds his hand out for Sumo to sniff. His face brightens in a shade of a smile as Sumo licks at his fingers, then he stretches up to pat him on the head. Sumo cranes his neck around, set on getting a thorough licking in.

“He’s big,” Connor decides.

“Yeah, he is that. His name’s Sumo.”

“Hello, Sumo,” Connor says quietly, in lieu of a hand to shake.

Hank makes some room and pulls down some blankets, giving Connor the choice spot between Sumo and himself to nestle in. They make it through half of some animated thing about frogs before Connor’s sound asleep again.

If Hank wakes up with a crick in his neck because he passed out on the couch with a blockhead dog and a little kid under his arm, well. It’s more than either of them have slept in a week, by Tara’s telling. So he’ll take it.

+++

Connor wakes up feeling heavy and tired. His stomach still hurts. But when Sumo sees he’s awake, the dog starts thumping his tail on the couch and grinning widely. Connor sneaks a hand out from under the covers and giggles a little when the dog licks at his fingertips.

Hank and Sharon make him pancakes with blueberries in them. They ask him if he likes school, and what he likes to do. Coloring or reading, that stuff. Connor tries to answer some of the questions, but when they ask what books he likes, his mind goes funny and blank.

He can feel that bubble rising up in his throat again, the one that makes him feel like a little-little kid, and he doesn’t like it, so he stops talking.

Sharon and Hank don’t seem to mind. Sharon keeps talking, explaining that they have a couple places to go. “Get you some more clothes, for one,” she says. “And we’re going to go visit Liam.”

Connor chases his fork around in the syrup. He doesn’t know what to say, so he nods.

“He’s going to come home with us soon. They think he’ll be ready in a few days. Does that sound good?”

He nods again. Liam can stand up, now. He’ll grab at Connor’s hands and arms and lift himself up and lean into him, and if Connor holds Liam’s hands and walks backwards, Liam follows him with these stomping, stumbling steps.

His mom was happy about that. She took a video of it and showed it to Connor. He made her play it again and again. He thought it was funny the way Liam’s burbling laughs sounded, weird and tinny through the speakers.

Hank lets Connor hold his hand as they walk through the hospital. There’s a lot of people and a lot of hallways, and Connor doesn’t know they’re at the right door until Hank’s stopping and kneeling and saying, “Tara thought you might have gotten scared the last time you were here.”

Connor shakes his head. He doesn’t know if he was scared. It smelled strange and it was loud but– he wasn’t scared, he doesn’t think. He just didn’t know what to do.

“Okay. Well, there’s a nurse here who’s going to explain things to you, alright?And if it gets too much, just say something or squeeze my hand. We can take a break if we need to, come out here where it’s quiet.”

“Okay,” Connor echoes back.

It’s calmer in the room this time. There’s only one doctor in a white coat, talking to Sharon in a low voice. He says hi to Connor and Connor says hi back.

He balances up on his toes to see Liam through the bright green bars of the crib. There aren’t as many wires and tubes as there used to be. Liam’s hair sticks up at funny angles. He scrunches his face in his sleep as Connor leans forward and whispers, “Hi, Nines.”

He’s supposed to whisper when Liam’s sleeping.

A nurse in scrubs covered with yellow ducks kneels down next to him. “They look a little weird, huh? Those tubes are to help him breathe and keep him comfortable. All these machines help us make sure his heart and lungs are doing okay.”

“He doesn’t look sick,” Connor says.

“He’s a lot better,” the nurse explains. “Would you like to hold him? I bet he’s been missing you.”

“I’m not s’posed to wake him.”

But Liam stirs at that; he starts to stretch and fuss and scrub at his face with chubby fists. “See? He heard you,” the nurse says.

Connor glances at the doctor, but this time when he says, “I’d like to hold him, please,” the doctor smiles and nods.

The nurse stands up and drops the bars down and fiddles with the tubes and wires and things. She tells Connor to sit and Hank points to a chair. It’s long; Connor sits with his sneakers sticking out in front of him, and there’s still room for Hank to sit on the end.

Liam’s starting to breathe in hiccuping little coughs that are usually the lead-up to crying as the nurse picks him up. But when the nurse walks around the crib, he sees Connor and starts to wriggle even more, twisting in her arms and reaching out and babbling his name the only way he does: “Nonner! Nonner, nonner–”

He’s flailing hands and babble as she sets him down, grasping at Connor’s shirt and his face even as the nurse is laughing and trying to explain how to be careful of the little plastic thing in the crook of his elbow.

Connor nods to the nurse and says, “Hi, hi Nines,” as he grabs the finger trying to tug at the curl of hair on his forehead. He splays his own fingers wide around Liam’s chubby fist, and Liam spreads his fingers out to match, even if they don’t quite reach past his palm.

He doesn’t sound tinny or weird. He laughs and he mimics Connor with a bright, “Ines!” He feels warm and heavy and real, as he tries to stand and falls back onto Connor’s legs with a thump.

He grips at Connor’s collar, trying to pull himself up again. Connor helps him balance for awhile, his hands under his arms. When he smiles Liam grins back, scrunching his nose and dropping his head forward to bop against Connor’s forehead.

The adults are all watching. When Liam blinks around and catches their stares, he hides his face against the crook of Connor’s shoulder. He plucks clumsily at the bear Connor tucked into his jacket pocket for safekeeping. Connor pulls it out and lets Liam drag it close as he starts to sleep again, settling down into soft little grumbling exhales.

“When’s he coming home?” Connor asks in his whisper-voice.

Hank and Sharon just look at him at first, blinking a lot; but Hank clears his throat and turns his head, saying, “Tomorrow?” and the doctor nods.

“Okay,” Connor says.

They untangle Liam’s hands from Connor’s shirt and put him back in the crib while he’s still sleeping. There’s flowers and balloons and things piled up on the table by the window, Connor realizes. Little toys, cards. And photographs in little frames.

The bear Hank gave him carries a little bit of Liam’s smell with it. He notices while he’s sitting in the back of the car; soap and baby powder and that sharper hospital smell.

They keep saying there’s nothing left, but there’s still Liam. That’s something.

They go to a store and help him pick out some things Liam might like. A few toys, a few books. Ones he knows, some that he can’t quite read to himself yet, but he thinks Liam will like them, too, if Connor learns to read them to him.

Connor asks if Liam can stay with him in the room with little pink flowers on the wallpaper. He hadn’t liked it in the dark, but he didn’t think he’d mind it if Liam was here. 

“’course, kid,” Hank says without hesitation.

They set up a crib and a little bookshelf and a handful of toys. They put new clothes in the dresser, some that Connor picked and some that Sharon and Hank picked. Sharon takes down the little ‘Welcome, Connor’ sign on the door and helps Connor add ‘+ Liam’ in his crooked letters.

Hank makes pasta and shows Connor how to throw a macaroni noodle so Sumo can catch it mid-air. Connor asks if they can watch a movie on the couch even after he changes into pajamas, and Hank and Sharon agree. They make popcorn and sit on either side of him, a blanket spread across the three of them.

(Sumo can catch popcorn too, it turns out. He’s even better at it than he is with noodles.)

Connor curls up under the blanket in the PJs he chose - blue with pawprints on them - and dreams of murmured voices.

A chiding, _What’re you looking at?_ and someone saying, _A good dad._

 _He **chose** you, _and a low rumble of, _Yeah, I think he did._

He wakes to predawn gray. The TV is dark, but Hank and Sharon are still here. Sharon snoring lightly, Sumo sprawled at their feet; and Hank with an arm thrown over Connor’s shoulders. He pulls his teddy bear close, and it smells like smoke, and his brother, and something new.

Different, but his.


End file.
